Lyrics Born Thurs April 29 Berbati’s Pan 10 SW 3rd In 1997, the Bay Area duo Latyrx (Lateef The Speaker and Lyrics Born) released a strange and experimental record, The Album. It was not an easy listen; it was rough, unadorned, and beat-heavy. It took listeners years to appreciate the release–and not for its beats, […]
Charles Mudede
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Hiphop’s Original Sick Mind
Blowfly Keeps It Dirty
Blowfly Sun April 3 Dante’s 1 SW 3rd As far as I can tell, the world has yet to produce a book on the 30-year history of hiphop that bothers to mention Blowfly, despite the fact that he’s been making rap records since the early ’70s. The reason for the omission is most likely that […]
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Escape Into Aesthetics
The Beautiful Hiphop of Souls of Mischief
Souls of Mischief Sat March 5 Berbati’s 10 SW 3rd The Bay Area’s Souls of Mischief have contributed one album to the hiphop canon (the group’s debut ‘93 ‘Til Infinity), and one single to that canon (“’93 ‘Til Infinity”). You know nothing about hiphop if you know nothing about this album (which established the Bay […]
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Gothic Hiphop
Grayskul’s Dark Matter for Dark Days
Grayskul Sat Feb 19 Conan’s 3862 SE Hawthorne The first track on Grayskul’s long-awaited debut Deadlivers, “Behold,” opens impressively with this line: “If ever there was a time in your life to be afraid/ I think this qualifies as the most terrifying of days.” The rapper who delivers this line (or blow, as it’s said […]
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The Spirit of Specs One
The Holy Ghost of Northwest Underground
Specs One Sat Feb 12 Tonic Lounge 3100 NE Sandy Blvd Born and raised in Seattle, Specs One has been in the world of hiphop since that world was born, 1979. Indeed, it’s almost impossible to find someone in that city whose life is more devoted to the production of hiphop art than that of […]
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Hiphop’s Dead Hand
The Robo-Rap of Hangar 18
Hangar 18 Wed Jan 26 Berbati’s Pan 10 SW 3rd Consisting of three members (a DJ, paWL, and two rappers, Alaska and Wind’n’Breeze), Hanger 18 is established in New York City’s underground hiphop scene. Their label is Def Jux, and like most groups who are signed to that label, which was founded in the late […]
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Bad Dreams
Wake Me Up When Buñuel’s Over
That Obscure Object of Desire dir. Buñuel Sun Jan 2-Thurs Jan 6 Clinton St. Theater Why do I dislike Luis Buñuel? Because he was a surrealist, and I dislike surrealism because it takes all of its clues from dreams. And I hate dreams because they bother my sleep. Nothing is worse than being subjected to […]
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Soul to Soul
De La Soul and the Beatmaker
De La Soul Fri Nov 1 Roseland 8 NW 6th Before completing a trilogy that began with 2000’s Mosaic Thump, hiphop greats De La Soul parted ways with Tommy Boy, the label that signed them back in 1987 and released the classic Three Feet High and Rising. De La’s latest, The Grind Date, out now […]
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Deep Concentration
Eyedea & Abilities Tighten Up
Eyedea & Abilities Wed Oct 20 Aladdin Theater 3017 SE Milwaukie The present importance of underground hiphop roughly corresponds with the importance of alternative rock in the late ’80s. Both are responses to the same types of musical developments and forms of exploitation. Established in 1997 with the end of Wu Tang Clan’s dynasty and […]
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From Bay Area to Beat Central
Gift of Gab’s NW Connection
Gift of Gab Tues Aug 31 Berbati’s Pan 10 SW 3rd Gift of Gab is the emcee for Blackalicious, a duo that stands among the elite of Bay Area’s underground hiphop. Recognized for raps that are dense in their rhythms and packed with concepts usually found in cultural theory books, Gift of Gab is a […]
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The Art of Engineering
Loscil Makes Space Sounds
Loscil Fri Aug 27 Holocene 1001 SE Morrison I understand that the man who makes music under the name Loscil (Scott Morgan) is a sound engineer. Sound engineers are not supposed to be musicians, but rather a class of people who are concerned with the science of recording musicians. To the point: sound engineers are […]
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What War Looks Like
Control Room Director Tells Al Jazeera’s Truths
Control Room dir. Noujaim Opens Fri July 2 Cinema 21 According to the director of Control Room, Jehane Noujaim, the idea of setting up a satellite news agency in Qatar came from an American think tank that believed it would help modernize the Arab world, and that a modernized Arab world would be less hostile […]